Steve Coogan on Thatcher portrayal in new drama: 'We cut something in the edit that was too kind'

Today, the lengthy, forensic television interview of yore is the political equivalent of dinosaur bones in the Natural History Museum. Celebrated with the quiet awe reserved for the extinct – and then turned into TV drama.

The drama of the television interview became my world last year when the 2019 Newsnight interview I did with Prince Andrew was serialised in A Very Royal Scandal and became a feature-length film in Scoop. But as 2025 begins, it feels like we aren’t done with the genre. There’s an appetite to see these moments of recent history set back in context – to flesh out the characters, to better understand them once the news cycle has stopped rolling.

And this is why we are meeting. Steve Coogan and Harriet Walter have re-created the 1980s interviews for London Weekend Television between Brian Walden and Margaret Thatcher in a two-part drama called Brian and Maggie. It’s based on Rob Burley’s book Why Is This Lying B*****d Lying to Me? about the potential the longform interview unlocks. It asks questions of the relationship between the protagonists. And whether in all powerful interviews there are the seeds of betrayal.

Coogan plays former Labour MP Brian Walden, who becomes disillusioned with his party, or perhaps with politics, and goes over to “the other side” to become a TV interviewer. His very first encounter is with the newish leader of the opposition, one Margaret Thatcher. The drama charts the subsequent interviews between them alongside the shifts of power.

“Of course I had huge antipathy towards Thatcher. I was very anti-Thatcher,” says 59-year-old Coogan – who grew up in Manchester and was 10 years old when she came into power. “And the one thing that I was worried about in this drama was being too compassionate because of her legacy… and because at the end, she was definitely a victim of sexism. Whether she knew it or not. Although she probably didn’t see it like that because she didn’t want to ally herself with ideological feminism.

“In fact, in the edit we cut something because I thought it was a bit too kind and we wanted to remind people that there was this damage. But her legacy is indisputable – that post-war consensus that she undid was tired and something needed to change, and she came along and made that change very clear. She had vision and zeal, but she lacked empathy. Now, she’d probably be diagnosed with some sort of disorder.

“However, she was an outsider who didn’t come through in a classic way – she was lower middle class, as was Walden, so they felt like they weren’t part of the establishment – and what she did interested me over and above their politics. The fact that Brian Walden and Margaret Thatcher had this sort of shared experience is what fascinates me – and I find her more interesting because of that. I have a lot of empathy with that. It’s not often discussed. Politics are discussed, but not the idea of class and the perspective that gives you.”

Coogan believes class in politics continues to be a problem. “There’s still a class issue that’s never been properly resolved. You either break out of your lower middle-class mediocrity and become like the establishment to succeed, or you languish in the margins.”

Thatcher was clearly not cowed by her class – or much else. In the drama she turns to Walden full beam after their first encounter and asks, with wide-eyed innocence, “Why do people fear the media?”. She famously understood its power – and relished her attempts to tame the beast. I’m curious to know if Coogan himself – who’s been so critical of the tabloid press – puts such weight behind the media.

“I’m not on social media because any point of view I have creatively, whether its political or just about people or culture, I’d rather channel into whatever I do. Because I think storytelling is a better way to put your point of view across, and you can be nuanced.”

It’s only half an answer. Because here we are, after all, discussing the power of the interview to change the game. Walden forces Thatcher onto uncomfortable territory – making her explain the sudden resignation of her chancellor, Nigel Lawson. He doesn’t ask the question 14 times, but it feels as if he does. There is a temerity to his persistence. Would Coogan put himself up for a longform interview if he was facing a scandal or the threat of “cancellation”?

“I don’t imagine getting cancelled because, despite my brush with the tabloids 25 years ago, I don’t go out trying to explain myself, I just put it in my work. I think sometimes people get cancelled because they are clumsy in their point of view and perhaps don’t adopt all these protocols they’re supposed to adopt. I just put it in my work.”

So why can’t politicians do that? Why do we think it’s important for them to go out and do the longform interview? Couldn’t they say the same – judge me by my work, my policies?

It’s different, he says, when those policies control people’s lives. “If you’re a politician it’s about your personal character. But I think good work should live by itself. Caravaggio murdered a man, but we don’t look at his work now and say, ‘I can’t look at a Caravaggio painting knowing he murdered a man 400 years ago.’ If the work is good it should stand by itself.”

And does the Caravaggio rule always apply, I wonder? Does he ever stop reading or stop watching someone he thinks has crossed a line? “In certain contexts, of course, but good work is good work. Annie Hall is a brilliant film. Undoubtedly a fantastic film. It will stand the test of time. But I look at Manhattan where the girl that Woody Allen is seeing is disturbingly young and it bothers me. So, it’s a bit nuanced, yes.”

Coogan and I first met in an electrifying debate in the Newsnight studio in July 2011 – the day after phone hacking revelations brought about the collapse of the News of the World. He shut down a phone hacker – who was trying to justify occasional tabloid “good works” – with the immortal burn, “Yeah, and Hitler was nice to dogs”. Twelve years on, with a change of government, but no meaningful regulation of the press, is he still as angry?

“The printed press has always been owned by a handful of billionaires. There was a chorus which was so distasteful at the time – ‘This is all about freedom of speech’ – but the same people were very happy with the fact that the overarching point of view of these papers they were writing for would never be at odds with the billionaire who owned their newspaper. That to me would be free speech. But this handful of individuals that could dictate the political agenda? That didn’t seem to bother them at all.”

So how does he feel about the one billionaire at the top of the tree now – with the loudest voice? How has Elon Musk changed the equation? He chuckles. “I always find it amusing that James Bond films used to have one nefarious villain. We’d say, ‘Oh that’s silly, there’s no such thing as that. It’s just a sort of enjoyable fiction.’ But that’s actually what you’re looking at – there are these individuals who are more powerful, who can actually shift the world on its axis. And right now that’s probably more trouble.”

He says that, first time round, he found the Trump victory “potentially quite a good thing. It meant that a non-establishment figure could corral people to upset the establishment, even though he’s an awful person. If someone came along with the charisma Donald Trump clearly had but was a good person and wanted to empower people with social mobility then they’d have a powerful effect. But there is no one on the other side who isn’t in the pocket of big business and with vested interests”.

And I’m reminded what an upside-down world this is, where Donald Trump – billionaire showbiz New York property magnate – is considered anti-establishment, while the working class bloke from Surrey who grew up with a sick mum, three siblings, four dogs and manual labourer dad, is considered part of the liberal elite. Why doesn’t Keir Rodney Starmer fit the Brian Walden/Margaret Thatcher template – he’s the most ordinary man in power?

“Yeeees… But to become part of the establishment you have to adopt all the protocols and all the points of view. Take this off-the-peg box of points of view and put them all on to play the part to get into politics.”

I think he’s telling me that Starmer isn’t radical enough. And my sense is confirmed when I ask him how he came across his Iron Lady, Harriet Walter – mesmerising with her uncanny Thatcher inflection and facial ticks.

“I met her a couple of times actually, at Extinction Rebellion events.” And he laughs. The image settling in our heads of the Brummie interlocutor and the longest serving prime minister of the 20th century colluding on non-violent roadblock resistance. And perhaps, somewhere in the recesses of the Coogan mind, there is a quiet admiration for the hand-bagged revolutionary. Just don’t ever expect him to say it out loud.

The latest issue of Radio Times is out now – subscribe here.

Brian and Maggie premieres on Wednesday 29th January at 9pm on Channel 4.

Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.